Excerpts of Arguments Presented by Attorneys

At the point when the officers leave for 360 Rockingham, . . . what is in their minds is what they’ve just seen at 875 South Bundy. They’ve seen a bloody crime scene with bloody shoe prints leaving from the crime scene and blood drops alongside to the left of them. . . . And that tells them that someone left the scene bleeding.

Moreover, they’ve seen a brown leather glove at the feet of one of the victims. They know that children, small ones, have been taken away from the scene and placed in police custody because they don’t know where to place those children. . . .

They also know of the celebrity status of the victim’s husband, the children’s father, who lives close by. So close by that he’s the most logical person to go to. You want to get to someone quickly who can take care of those children. As quickly as you can. The celebrity status of the victim, of the victim’s husband, is important because we know about . . . stalkers.

We know that these things are in an officer’s mind and reasonably so, because he has to be considering everything--every possibility that may occur. If he fails to take into account every possibility, then we justifiably are upset.

“Why didn’t you think of that, officer? Why didn’t you protect these people? That’s your job.” . . .

With all of that in mind, the officers go to 360 Rockingham and attempt to raise someone inside the house. They ring the intercom repeatedly and get no answer--yet there are lights on. There are lights on downstairs, there’s a light on upstairs. There are cars in the driveway.

They contact Westec (a security firm) and find out that a maid should be there full time. And at a property of that size, it’s probably not unreasonable to think that someone should be there full time looking over it. And yet they don’t reach anyone. Then they finally get the house phone and they call that phone number. And there’s no answer, once again.

Now their concern has to mount. These are human beings, these detectives, and they know all of the concerns are still pressing on them. No answer to the intercom, no answer to the house phone, and there’s lights on and there’s cars in the driveway. They have to be concerned.

Now, a detective has indicated, “I see the car in front of the house. It seems to be parked kind of hastily. And I see what I think is a spot of blood on the door handle.”

They’ve come from a bloody crime scene where someone was left bleeding. They get to this location, they see a spot of blood.

Your Honor, I don’t care if it’s a spot of blood as big as a dime or as big as a quarter, it’s unusual to find blood on an otherwise clean car.

And a car that’s parked hastily. One that belongs to Mr. Simpson, . . . whose ex-wife has just been found dead in a bloody mess two miles away.

It is absolutely incumbent upon them to do something at that point to assure themselves that the people inside that house are safe and secure--that there is not something horribly amiss, because they’ve just come from a scene so gory that nothing could be more amiss than that.

And the connection directly to the household of Mr. Simpson is absolutely clear, and if they were to stand outside and think about leaving--think about waiting until Mr. Simpson came home while someone may have lain dying, bleeding in that location--we would justifiably be upset.

We would justifiably call them derelict in their duty. . . . We would have said that they were incompetent. We would have said nothing good about the manner in which they fulfilled their duties, because they would not have been fulfilling their duties.

Instead, they did fulfill their duties. (And, while doing so), they happened upon evidence.